Well, that didn't take very

moat — Fri, 10 Feb 2017 13:10:26 +0000

Well, that didn't take very long.

While the Trump and GOP agendas may be at cross purposes on many issues, there is a disconcerting synergy developing on the military side.

U.S. General Seeks ‘a Few

artappraiser — Fri, 10 Feb 2017 11:25:51 +0000

In reply to US commander in Afghanistan requests several thousand new troops

U.S. General Seeks ‘a Few Thousand’ More Troops in Afghanistan

By Michael R Gordon, New York Times, Feb. 9

[....] General Nicholson repeated previous assessments that the sanctuary Taliban fighters and militant groups enjoy in Pakistan remains a major obstacle. “It is very difficult to succeed on the battlefield when your enemy enjoys external support and safe haven,” said the commander, who added that the United States needed to do a “a holistic review” of its policy toward Pakistan.

The issue of safe havens in Pakistan also was discussed Thursday when the new defense secretary, Jim Mattis, spoke by telephone with Gen. Qamar Javed Bajwa, Pakistan’s chief of army staff. In the conversation, “Gen. Bajwa reiterated Pakistan’s commitment to counter all militant groups operating in its territory,” according to a Pentagon statement.

In his Senate testimony, General Nicholson also complained that Russia was trying to “legitimize” the Taliban by creating the “false narrative” that the militant organization has been fighting the Islamic State and that Afghan forces have not. Russia’s goal, he asserted, was “to undermine the United States and NATO” in Afghanistan, expressing a far more skeptical view of the Kremlin’s intentions than President Trump.

On the positive side, he said, the area in which Islamic State fighters operate in Afghanistan had been greatly reduced.

General Nicholson’s argument amounted to an implicit criticism of the approach taken by former President Barack Obama, who imposed a series of rigid troop ceilings and significantly reduced the number of American forces in Afghanistan — though not by as much as he had initially projected.

But the broader question is what course President Trump might chart on Afghanistan. Senator John McCain, the Arizona Republican who chairs the Armed Services Committee, said that for too long the United States strategy had been “not to lose,” and urged that a plan be devised to break the stalemate.

General Nicholson said the administration was working on one [....]

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Well, that didn't take very

U.S. General Seeks ‘a Few